No, I didn't forget how to spell my own name, I might actually talk about cats! Which reminds me, I've been married for over 26 years to the same man and in his cell phone my number is listed under "Cat" and when I pointed out to him that he spelled my name wrong, he actually said, "Does it really matter?" Uh, YES, asshole...
Been trying for over a week now to come up with something interesting or funny to blog about or even something to bitch about but I have come up empty handed. Can you believe that? Kat has NOTHING to bitch about! Seriously, nothing exciting is happening in Kat Land, nothing traumatic has happened in some time, nothing or nobody has pissed me off in awhile, well there is that Biggest Loser thing Tuesday night, but we won't go there today... So it leaves me with nothing. I hate having nothing.
I refuse to believe, which might actually mean PARTICIPATE, that Thanksgiving is next week which will then be followed by the dreaded Christmas. ARGGHHH... The only thing exciting about this whole scenario is I get two days off next week and I will get two days off for Christmas and two days for New Years. And that about sums up my holiday spirit.
So... In talking with a couple of girlfriends about the pros and cons of adopting dogs as pest controllers, one of them showed me a picture of a rat terrier dog that she wanted to get for her rodent problem. My apologies to those of you out there that have one of these creatures, but man that was one ugly ass dog. Which led to the discussion of cats as a better alternative to pest control, except she didn't like cats. However, in my excellent salesperson of the year mode, I believe that I have convinced her to buy her baby girl a kitten for Christmas - I'm so good.
Our discussion led me to ask if I had ever told them my 'cat story' and it appears that I have not shared this tale with many people, not even blog land Or maybe I have and don't remember it because I have been having menopausal memory issues lately and I am too lazy to go back and research if I've shared it, either way you get to hear it, even if you've heard it. Disclaimer - don't be sending me any mean and hateful emails or comments about my being a murderer either, I KNOW that and I live with it every day of my life...
In true Kat Land form, when things go wrong, shit rolls down hill and things kind of spiral out of control, needless to say this was one of those times. When we purchased our home about 19 some odd years ago, we learned that we had a serious rat infestation. In all fairness, and not because we were gross slobs, the house that we purchased had been vacant for several years due to the fact that the owner was in a nursing home and once she croaked her children couldn't wait to unload the house. Thus being vacant for all those years, the rats moved in and took up residence unknown to us and we got a helluva a deal . Hubby's solution to the rat infestation, after we spent thousands of dollars on 'professional' pest controllers that could not control the problem, was to buy a cat. I was not a cat person and actually was allergic to cats, or so I thought, and needless to say was not thrilled with this solution but I was less thrilled with living with rats.
Hubby took me to the local shelter to find a cat and I fell in love with a beautiful black and white kitten. Hubby tried to convince me that we were looking for a cat not a kitten but I was adamant that if we were going to get one of these creatures only this one would do. I didn't like any other color of the kittens or cats, they all gave me the creeps. The only one my heart fell for was the black and white kitten. We brought her home, named her Sheba, got her fixed and she became my baby. I actually don't recall if Sheba ever killed any rodents, but she was the queen (well the princess anyway) in our house and we all loved her.
Fast forward five or so years and one extremely cold and dreary December on a Sunday evening, just a week or so before Christmas, I was busy doing the week's laundry. Since I hate doing laundry more than anything in the world, I would procrastinate and it would take me a full weekend to complete the chore. Hubby is a construction worker so his work clothes are always the last load to do. Around 10:00 or so I took the load of his clothes out to the garage to throw them in the dryer and discovered that the dryer door was open and the load of towels sitting in it were still wet. CRAP. I knew that I would have to wait for these towels to dry so that I could throw Hubby's clothes in the dryer and so I slammed the dryer door and turned it on. Went back in the house, bitching and moaning that I had to stay up past my bedtime while everyone was tucked safely and warmly into their beds.
About one hour or so later, that procrastination thing again, I went out in the garage to switch the loads. The dryer was still running and pretty hot and when I opened the door and bent over to pull the towels out, a scene straight from the exorcist happened right in front of my eyes! My cat, my beautiful Sheba, had apparently been in the dryer with the towels when I slammed the door and turned it on. And she had been cycling for an hour! After my blood curdling scream and panicky run to wake Hubby, he was able to get her out and she was a horrible mess but still alive. In my panic I called 9-1-1 to find out what to do and they sent me to an all night emergency animal hospital. I was too freaked to handle it so Hubby took Sheba and they assured him that they could make her all better, just give them $500 now. We were so distraught that we gave them the money and then stayed up all night crying and consoling each other while calling the hospital every hour on the hour. The emergency hospital closed at 7 am and they told us we would need to have her picked up before then.
We finally went to bed around 2:00 in the morning since Hubby had to leave for work at 5 am. As Hubby left, I had just stepped out of the shower when I heard a loud boom and felt the house rock. With just a towel I ran out to the front yard and as I watched Hubby's tail lights driving up the street I heard a horrible hissing sound and discovered that as Hubby was pulling his trailer from the side of the house he had hit the gas meter and broken it. My first thought was explosion and getting my kids out of the house. I ran hysterically back into the house and threw on the first clothes I came to and quickly woke C1 and C2 up and screamed at them to get dressed and ran and grabbed C3 from his crib as we all dashed out of the house, shoeless, to the neighbors house across the street.
The house caught fire and since this was during the pre-cell phone era, the only way to get a hold of Hubby was to send my Dad to his job and I asked my Mom to go pick up the cat. During the aftermath my Mom came back with the cat (in the trunk of her car) and pulled me aside and told me that the cat looked pretty bad and she was taking it directly to her vet. The vet ended up assuring us that it was much more humane to put Sheba to sleep and couldn't believe the emergency hospital had not made the same suggestion.
We were soon moving into an apartment because our house was uninhabitable and I was explaining to my children that within a mere 24 hours their house had almost burnt down and I had murdered the beloved Sheba. Many, many tears were shed and shortly after my BFF and several others went on a mad hunt to find a replacement Sheba. Finally a replacement was found but with one problem, she was a he. I went to the shelter were he had been located, fell in love again, had him fixed and soon brought him home and he was quickly christened 'Sheba Two'. I never divulged that she was a he until many, many years later when I was called out. Thankfully, eventually the children forgave my deception. She/He is still my princess and will be 14 years old this Christmas. Well at least that's one good thing to celebrate at Christmas!
